


it can creep up inside you (and consume you)

by SafelyCapricious



Series: ain't no grave can hold my body down [1]
Category: The Punisher (TV 2017)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magical Realism, Alternate Universe - Modern with Magic, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-02
Updated: 2020-10-02
Packaged: 2021-03-07 18:22:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,725
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26762041
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SafelyCapricious/pseuds/SafelyCapricious
Summary: Smoke curls up from underfoot, and Karen is careful not to look down as she strides towards the Bulletin, but it burns her nose and she is careful to keep her mouth closed lest some get in. Others walk through, unconcerned, and she wonders yet again if the city has simply ground them down so much that they don’t care what they might be inhaling, if they think themselves protected, or if they’re hoping for something. She crosses the street and the smell of brimstone dissipates, though the smoke continues to rise in curious tendrils.People in the country don’t behave like this -- like what’s happening around them isn’t. Like their ignoring it will somehow keep them safe.
Relationships: Frank Castle & Karen Page, Frank Castle/Karen Page
Series: ain't no grave can hold my body down [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1950148
Comments: 7
Kudos: 43





	it can creep up inside you (and consume you)

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Rihanna's Disturbia because it's what was playing when I was failing to come up with a title.
> 
> ALRIGHT EVERYONE this is day one of FICTOBER ARE WE READY (no why are we doing this why do I hate myself?) 
> 
> Nah, I'm still fairly chipper about this. 
> 
> I think I want to expand this universe and it's not like...actively shippy but we'll see. Maybe there will be a part two later this month.
> 
> Oh snap, almost forgot. This is for prompt "Horns". ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯

Smoke curls up from underfoot, and Karen is careful not to look down as she strides towards the Bulletin, but it burns her nose and she is careful to keep her mouth closed lest some get in. Others walk through, unconcerned, and she wonders yet again if the city has simply ground them down so much that they don’t care what they might be inhaling, if they think themselves protected, or if they’re hoping for something. She crosses the street and the smell of brimstone dissipates, though the smoke continues to rise in curious tendrils.

People in the country don’t behave like this -- like what’s happening around them _isn’t_. Like their ignoring it will somehow keep them safe.

It’s simply arrogance, she feels, how they seem to walk through the city and yet -- things _are_ different in the city.

The bodega at the corner where she ducks in to grab a coffee -- bitter and burnt from being in the pot too long, but so much cheaper than any of the chains -- has a pair of red devil horns carved and painted above the door and a skull at shoulder height chipped into the wood. She touches the skull as she goes in and out, a lifetime habit of respecting protection that somehow isn’t dimmed by personally knowing those whose blessing she’s asking.

A boy jumps up to touch the horns, and she can’t help but grin -- she’d fall if she attempted the same in her heels, but it’s a good gesture. Though it’s curious the owners are appealing to both Matt and Frank -- and she wonders for a moment what the two of them make of it. She’s still in the habit of touching any protection when she goes into a place, but always only one. She wonders what would happen if she tried to touch both. She wonders what it means that even when both are easily accessible she only chooses one. She tries not to think too deeply about why she chooses the one she does.

Best not to think about it.

She steps aside for a skateboarder and drops a few coins into the hat laying in front of a slumped figure. She’s careful not to look, least she sees sharp teeth or glowing eyes or pointed ears or -- it’s best not to look, out of respect. And least her donation be seen as a request for something she’d rather not comprehend.

By the time she makes it into the building the wind has shifted and though it’s summer there’s a chill bite to the air that makes her glad to be heading inside. She’s heard reports of a turf war between two gangs up in Harlem, and it’s not a stretch to think that might be the cause. Rumor has it that one of the gangs has sworn fealty to an ice giant, and the other a djinn. Jody was given the topic since Ellison said she was less likely to end up frozen or burnt from her research, and besides he needs Karen following the corruption of some CEO.

***

When she leaves, hours later, the chill has settled in, thick and searching, across the city, and she pulls her light cardigan tighter around her shoulders and swears under her breath. She’s got a walk back to the metro, six stops, and another short walk before she’s home, and while part of her thinks if she moves quickly that maybe she can stay warm she knows that moving quickly can attract the wrong kind of attention.

Her lip starts to bleed from her chewing on it, before she’s made it into the metro. She keeps her gaze averted from the something taking up two seats by the entrance and oozing, just her and it and the drunk passed out on a nearby seat, until she reaches her stop and carefully steps out.

She ducks into a deli before home, so that she can grab something warm -- soup -- and not have to pretend for an instant that she has the will or motivation to cook. There’s a grey fist on a ceramic medallion hanging by the door that she touches on her way in and out. 

Her soup is in a bag, and she still has a folder of old case files she wants to take a second look at, which she has to balance when she gets to her door, and so she’s got the key in the lock and the lock turned before she touches the protections on her own door. Her landlord objected to another family posting protections, just a few days after she’d moved in, so she didn’t try to talk him into it, instead carefully painting what she wanted and then covering it with a layer of the grey paint that coats the rest of the hallway so no one else can see it. Her fingertips burn and she drops the soup and files and bolts, leaving her keys where they are.

There are footsteps behind her but there’s a lock on the south stairway, even though it’s against building code, and she’s thrown it and is out in the cold street without even seeing who is chasing her. She gives herself only a second to take a deep breath of foul cold air and to breathe it out before letting her feet guide her away from home.

She doesn’t know where she’s going, but that’s better, because if she doesn’t know where she’s going they won’t know either.

***

When no one has caught up with her, fifteen minutes later, she finds a twenty-four hour diner to duck into and contemplate her options.

Now that her heart isn’t pounding out of her chest she finds herself irritated more at the loss of soup than anything else. Later, probably, once she’s seen what they’ve actually done to her apartment -- once she’s able to go back, she’ll be mad about that. But for now she mourns the loss of her soup, even as she orders a burger and coffee from the menu the tired waitress puts in front of her.

The soup at her family’s diner had always been sitting there all day -- had always been where the not quite as good vegetables went and -- she’s not sure that this diner is the same, but she tries to never order soup in diners.

“Food’ll be out in just a minute, honey,” the waitress says, pouring her a cup of bitter caffeine and wandering away.

Karen doesn’t bother to doctor her coffee, instead just wrapping her hands around it and taking a fortifying sip. Her eyes wander across the off white laminate as she tries to decide what to do.

She could, theoretically, contact the police. She can almost hear Bret telling her to do just that...But the thing is, she doesn’t know who is after her, or why. Hell, all she knows is that someone had been inside her apartment and her doorway protection buzzed against her fingers -- it could’ve been something as mild as her landlord letting someone in for maintenance. The thought of her landlord actually bothering to have any maintenance done before she’s spent months reminding him about it makes her want to laugh -- but she knows the police aren’t going to jump to the worst case scenario.

Well, with her they might. She has been known to attract trouble a time or two.

Her mug clinks against the dull surface of the table and she idly runs her fingers along the edge, pausing and shifting back so she can see when her fingers encounter rough texture instead of the smooth edge, and then she wants to laugh.

She holds it in, because sitting in a diner laughing by herself isn’t exactly a good way to be seen but -- but there, carved into the table right where she’s sitting is a little white skull. Smirking, she rubs her thumb over it and lets out a breath.

It’s silly-- but it makes her feel better. Makes her feel like she chose the right diner and the right table and -- it’s silly but it makes her feel safe.

“Here ya go, hun,” the waitress slides her burger to her and, after a quick exchange of nods, tops the cup of coffee off before bustling away. Karen smiles after her and then freezes at the figure who just came in -- and wants to laugh again.

Her thumb rubs against the skull again as she watches Frank look around -- and freeze for a moment when he sees her. She offers him a nod -- small enough that if he’s here for some reason and doesn’t want her involved his ignoring it won’t be obvious, but enough to tell him she’s not here for anything.

It’s possible, she thinks, as Frank exchanges a word with the waitress and then heads to her table, that whoever carved this into the table put something actually behind it -- that she accidentally summoned him. (She thinks that’s unlikely, because he’s dressed like Frank, not like the Punisher -- but a young kid with a knife and the desire to carve symbols might not even know they were putting anything into the workings.)

“Y’okay?” he asks, when he sits down, dark eyes assessing her thoroughly.

She hums behind a sip of coffee, and watches his shoulders relax slightly, before he turns to make his order.

“I’m spooked, but unharmed,” she says, honestly, once the waitress has gone off, and she watches his eyes sharpen even as he pulls his fresh cup of coffee towards his side of the table.

She’s sure he’s got the rest of the diner cased before she even finishes formulating how she wants to explain the situation that chased her out of her apartment -- and away from her soup. It’s a quick explanation, as she doesn’t know much, but she doesn’t hesitate to tell him her feelings — to tell him about how the protection had buzzed it’s warning and that someone _had_ chased her for at least the hallway.

“You should’ve called,” he says, after she’s answered his questions as best she could and they’ve both turned to their food.

“I was considering it,” she admits with a shrug, “but they didn’t catch me and it didn’t seem urgent.”

He scoffs at her and shakes his head, and she smiles into her coffee.

**Author's Note:**

> PS I think she def crashes at his place.
> 
> Per usual, if you wanna ask me questions or bug me plz come find me on [on my writing tumblr](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/capriciouswrites).
> 
> We're in for a long haul of fictober ya'll. 
> 
> Please let me know what you think! 
> 
> Hope everyone is having a day.


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